Contradictions? What contradictions?
Blair gave a speech on multiculturalism. (Maybe if he’s very good, next week he’ll be allowed to have a debate on the subject with Madeleine Bunting.) He said some slightly odd things…
Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs and other faiths have a perfect right to their own identity and religion, to practice their faith and to conform to their culture. This is what multicultural, multi-faith Britain is about. That is what is legitimately distinctive.
But when it comes to our essential values – belief in democracy, the rule of law, tolerance, equal treatment for all, respect for this country and its shared heritage – then that is where we come together, it is what we hold in common…
But those two can be in flat contradiction. Blair surely knows that. Is the idea that people are just supposed to ignore that problem? The fact that practicing a ‘faith’ and conforming to a culture can rule out belief in and practice of equal treatment for all? He must know that, he’s not silly – so what does he mean by saying that? Is it just that anodyne but impossible formulas are required for speeches of this kind?
Actually he does admit the problem farther down. (But then why state it this way farther up? Won’t he confuse his hearers?)
[W]e stand emphatically at all times for equality of respect and treatment for all citizens. Sometimes the cultural practice of one group contradicts this. We need very clear rules for how we govern the public realm. A good example is forced marriage. There can be no defence of forced marriage on cultural or any other grounds.
Right. Good. But then it’s no good saying people have a perfect right to practice their ‘faith’ and to conform to their culture when in fact that right is (very properly) limited. That’s misleading.
Andy Armitage sent me the link to this speech and pointed out this passage:
One of the most common concerns that has been raised with me, when meeting women from the Muslim communities, is their frustration at being debarred even from entering certain mosques. Those that exclude the voice of women need to look again at their practices. I am not suggesting altering the law. But we have asked the Equal Opportunities Commission to produce a report by the spring of next year on how these concerns could be practically addressed, whilst of course recognising that in many religions the treatment of women differs from that of men.
Well, okay, but that looks like some thin ice up ahead. But good luck with it.
Wow! Quake-in-your-boots time! The government is going to ask a quango to produce a report. Oh, Allah, help us! And by next spring! Shit! This is serious stuff, brothers. Should we not do something about our archaic practices before this terrible fate befalls us?
The Government funded Runnymede Trust “Commission on the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain” (2000), was a kind of sealing of the vision of multicultural Britain:
http://www.runnymedetrust.org/projects/meb/report.html
Here’s a couple of examples of what the Commission chose to include in their report from what I presume are comments solicited by the Commission for the preparation of the report:
The Report: Part One – A Vision for Britain
http://www.runnymedetrust.org/projects/meb/reportPartOne.html
Rethinking the National Story
The future of Britain lies in the hands of…descendants of slave owners and slaves, of indentured labourers, of feudal landlords and serfs, of industrialists and factory workers, of lairds and crofters, of refugees and asylum-seekers.
From a response to the Commission
The Report : Part Three – Strategies of Change
http://www.runnymedetrust.org/projects/meb/reportPartThree.html
Organisational Change
Racism is often portrayed as though it is something like a disease which can be cured…[Racist beliefs] are reinforced in so many ways in white people, from the cradle… It is not a question of curing me, but of me acknowledging my racism and taking responsibility for operating in an anti-racist way personally and encouraging organisations and institutions in which I have an influence to do the same.
From a response to the Commission, 1998
Follow up events
http://www.runnymedetrust.org/projects/meb/followUpEvents.html
The report was welcomed on behalf of the Government by the Home Secretary on the day of publication (11 October 2000) and by Baroness Amos on the following day.
I don’t care what your misbegotten religion and cultural practice says.
Youi are not allowed to treat women as third-class semi-citizens in this country.
And I really don’t care which religion it is, either.
But can we see creepy christian Bliar realising this?
Naah!
I think what’s not spelled out in the first extract was the phrase ‘consistent with the law of the land’. Perhaps he assumed that this should ‘go without saying’.
Hmm – I think that’s only one possible choice for what’s not spelled out. Another would be ‘consistent with human rights,’ another would be ‘consistent with not harming others,’ and so on. But in an argument of this kind, of course, assuming anything goes without saying won’t do at all, since he is engaged in, precisely, saying. He’s engaged in spelling out and making explicit what are the implications of multiculturalism, and what it should and shouldn’t mean, so leaving anything implicit would simply be the opposite of what he’s attempting to do – in other words, a mistake. So if that is what he assumed, he made a mistake.
The attempt to gloss over the potential conflict between multiculturalism and individual rights is part of a long-established New Labour practice. Norman Fairclough in his book “New Labour, New Language” noted in 2001 the tendency of Blair’s statements to try and reconcile incompatibles between left and right, free market and welfare, rights and responsibilties, etc. So you’re right, OB, when you say that “impossible formulas are required for speeches of this kind”.
NO TRUE MUSLIM …
From Blair’s speech:
Of course the extremists that threaten violence are not true Muslims in the sense of being true to the proper teaching of Islam.
Glad to know that Blair is now an Islamologist.
Now let’s concoct some other things that ‘no true Muslim’ can do:
No true Muslim wears the niqab or the hijab.
No true Muslim practices polygamy.
No true Muslim believes that adulterers should be stoned to death.
etc.
In fact, no true Muslim believes virtually anything set out in the Quran or in Shariah law.
True Muslims = nice people like ourselves just that they don’t eat pork.
That’s what you get when wish replaces thought.
It’s Nigel Warburton’s ‘no true sense of humour’ item, again. Only more so.